Week 4 at Hackbright

Week 4 - another challenging one! Just when I feel like I've grasped one new concept or syntax, we're onto another, and I feel as perplexed as when we started, though I know I've already come a long way.

First, a delightful fish picture, since that is the other major part of my life right now, and more interesting to photograph than code! Note: if you're squeamish, skip the 2nd picture (below).

Recently, we've had a bunch of Black Gill Rockfish left over from deliveries, and decided to make some lovely ceviche with it. Ingredients were simple -- citrus juice (lime & orange), cilantro, red onions, radishes, cucumbers and avocado. On the side are some whole wheat pita, toasted into chips. YUM!

This week we've been working with Flask, SQLite3 and JavaScript, which are awesomely powerful when pieced together. Even while I don't grasp precisely how to use these tools, its easy to imagine what they're capable of. And kind of amazing to realize that basically the entire internet (and most computer software) is built on top of these simple databases, queries & functions! Of course there's a little more to it all than that, when you factor in graphics, design and usability, but much of that is the so-called icing on the cake.

Anyway, I haven't stopped feeling overwhelmed, and am looking into staying over in SF a couple nights a week, so I can focus on studying & still get a good night's sleep. The thought of a 20 or 30-minute commute to a place where I can delve back into the computer for another few hours unhindered makes me wistful... Not that I don't absolutely adore my amazing husband & crazy kitty, but my time at Hackbright is so limited, I really want to make the most of the remaining weeks.

And now for picture two: Smelt heads! I processed a bunch of night smelt for a customer who had requested fish without heads; it was pretty funny & interesting to wind up with a tupperware full of little fish heads. Also fun to dissect a couple of 'em and check out the brains, sand/pebbles, tongue & tiny little bones inside.

Quick & Easy Fish Soup

Tonight we had a surplus of black gill rockfish on our hands, along with some fish stock, veggies, and very little time. We threw together a soup pretty quickly that ended up being delicious!

Here's what was in it:

• 1/2 lb rockfish fillets
• 3 cups stock of your choice
• 2 tbsp citrus juice (orange, lemon, lime, etc)
• 1/4 cup white wine OR 1 tbsp sweet vinegar
• 1 carrot, diced
• 1 celery stalk, diced
• 1/2 cup frozen peas
• 1 cup frozen spinach
• 1 shallot OR 1/2 cup onion, diced
• Olive oil

Here's what we did:

In a saucepan on medium heat, sauté onion, carrot & celery in some olive oil for about 5 minutes. Add stock, wine/vinegar and citrus, bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Add peas & spinach, stirring to mix well and maintaining the boil. Add fish; cover and reduce heat to low. Simmer for 5-7 minutes, until fillets begin to form visible flakes. Serve immediately.

Week 3 at Hackbright

Today is the first day of Week 3, and it's already great. We wrapped up last week with DevFest Silicon Valley at Google HQ on Friday... It was intimidating and awesome. Almost all attendees were women(!) and though most of the talks were over my head, I learned some cool things about browser functionality, HTML5, user-sniffing & feature detection. And our fabulous teacher Liz gave a hilarious & very relevant talk on gay marriage's impact on databases!

Google HQ kiiiinda feels like the center of the universe. There are obviously Very Important Things happening at all times, which necessitated security escorts everywhere, including the restroom. Not even kidding. They also had those crazy automated toilets with heated seats in every stall, further emphasizing how even poops at Google are Very Important Things requiring much consideration, attention and even temperature control.

So although I'm starting out with little sleep and 2nd-degree burns on my face (fish fry casualty), I am SO EXCITED because today my pair partner Kelley and I completed an awesome assignment -- we created a Twitter bot that compiles bits of text from Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" to make "new" 140-character poems!!!

Our bot! Click to see him in action.

Also, this morning I met one of my idols: Paul Johnson, who wrote the amazing book Fish Forever -- required reading for anyone who cares about seafood & sustainability. J & I woke up super early & headed into SF to pick up fish from Paul's company, Monterey Fish Market, for the first time! We took a quick tour around their facility, saw their guys cutting up LOTS of gorgeous fish, and talked conservation, catch methods & seafood seasonality with two of the most knowledgeable and engaged people in the local seafood movement! It was a thrill.

This week at Hackbright we'll be learning about cool stuff like regular expressions, SQL and of course, even more useful & interesting applications for python. I'll also be cooking up some blackgill rockfish at home & for our customers, trimming smoked albacore loins & turning those trimmings into a tuna salad for samples at Three Stone Hearth on Wednesday, and hopefully meeting & connecting with a techie mentor on Weds. night!! So much awesome.

Week 2 at Hackbright

After an action-packed weekend, I'm back at Hackbright for week 2. I'm definitely feeling more comfortable with the basics, but we're rushing right ahead into some fairly advanced (for me!) object-oriented programming, which leaves me on shaky ground.

I'm pretty sure I'm the only person in my class who's co-running a business and also working at a part-time job (tutoring) in addition to this course; it's probably not the best idea. If I had only one of those outside commitments, I'm sure I would be able to get a little more rest and rejuvenation over the weekends, but since I have both, they're making me a little crazy.

Today we worked on a source file for a maze-type game, which was really fun and challenging. It's exciting to be able to think of something I want to do and then work through how to make that happen -- and even more exciting when it actually does happen! Problem-solving can be exhausting though, and by 6pm I've been running out of brain juice.

This week, I resolve to go to sleep early. Gotta keep the brain juice reserves well-stocked.

Day 2 at Hackbright

It's been over 5 years since I've updated this blog, but here goes.

Today was my second day of class at Hackbright Academy.  It's a whirlwind! So many super-smart, ambitious and interesting women in one place. Already I feel like I've learned more than I thought possible in such a short time.

My brain seems to be adjusting well to the code mindset. It's been so much fun to work through the assignments and problems, and to see the various solutions that everyone comes up with. I can't help but compare it to food -- particularly recipe writing, which I have plenty of experience doing.

Both rely on a specific set of ingredients and tools, and a static code for telling the user how to combine those elements into the desired product. Good recipes, like good code, follow rules about syntax, order and logic. And just like in cooking, if you're writing code, the best way to tell if you did something wrong is by sampling the end product!